ISLAMABAD, June 4, 2021: The Sindh Assembly left 75 percent agenda unaddressed amid absence of movers and protest by the opposition lawmakers, observes Free and Fair Election Network (FAFEN) in its Daily Factsheet on Friday.

Following are some key observations of the House proceedings during the seventh sitting of the 21st session:

Members’ Participation

• The House met for an hour and 17 minutes.
• The sitting started at 03:10 pm against the scheduled time of 02:00 pm.
• The speaker chaired the entire sitting.
• The deputy speaker was not present.
• The leader of the house (chief minister) did not attend the sitting.
• The leader of the opposition attended the entire sitting.
• Forty-six legislators (28 percent) were present at the outset and 61 (37 percent) at the end of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of PTI, PPPP and MMAP were present while the leaders of GDA, TLP and MQMP did not attend the sitting.
• Six out of nine minority lawmakers were present.

Output

• The House passed the Sindh Evacuee Trust Properties (Management and Disposal) Bill, 2019 after presentation of Standing Committee’s report on it.

Representation and Responsiveness

• The House took up three out of six starred question related to Sindh Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority. In addition, the lawmakers asked eight supplementary questions.
• Minister for Education responded to a calling attention notice (CAN) regarding strategy of Sindh government to conduct annual examinations from Class 9 to 12 during coronavirus situation.
• Three CANs remained unaddressed as their movers were protesting in the House at time of their consideration while two others were not taken up due to mover’s absence.
• A lawmaker belonging to MMAP withdrew his privilege motion on the assurance of Minister for Parliamentary Affairs. The motion was regarding implementation on a resolution adopted by the House.
• An adjournment motion regarding decision of federal government to take control of hospitals in Sindh was dropped due to mover’s absence.

Order and Institutionalization

• The MQMP and PTI lawmakers protested for 36 minutes during the proceedings after being disallowed by the Chair to speak on water shortage issue in Karachi. The Chair also suspended the proceedings for 16 minutes amid their protest.
• The House was adjourned to meet again on Monday, June 7, 2021 at 02:00 pm.

Transparency

• ‘List of Business’ was available to the legislators, observers and others.
• The attendance of lawmakers was not available to the observers and media.

This daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Sindh Assembly proceedings conducted by Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF), a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are excepted